“You’re out of luck. I’ve known him the longest, three years to be exact, and he’s said very little except he was brought up in a bunch of foster families in California. He went to college a couple of years somewhere in Oregon to study acting and anthropology. He knows a lot about Indians. That’s about all I know. He’s certainly unfaithful to his lovers but you get used to it. I worry that he’s burning himself out with Viagra and Cialis. I know he has prostate problems. No wonder.”
“Why does he go for the young stuff?”
“Are you taping this?”
“No. That would be illegal.” He was amused by this.
“The young girl thing is theological. He sees himself as a god with a small g. It’s important a girl’s first sexual contact be with him if she is to live a powerful life. They are actually not of illegal age in most countries.”
“I see,” he said, but he didn’t. He knew all of this in bits and pieces but it certainly didn’t make a cogent whole.
“He thinks modern times suck and for health we must return to old-timey pagan life. We do a lot of drum dancing and free sex. He says that he is many persons.”
“Do you believe this?” He was trying to ignore the mental image of Carla’s butt glistening under the porch light near the woodpile.
“Some days I do and some days I don’t. I’m mostly in love with him which is hard work.”
When he hung up Sunderson was mostly amazed at his own sloppiness. In his long experience his habit was to locate the problem criminals, “the person of interest,” as they are currently referred to, and then bear down hard. While unwrapping a piece of thawed venison and pouring a small drink it occurred to him that when he got interested in this case he was nearly retired and he likely subconsciously wanted to prolong it to give himself something intriguing to do. How could cult members willingly sacrifice their underage daughters? How could Abraham be willing to sacrifice his son Isaac? How did religion derange the human mind? Would the Shiites and Sunnis ever stop killing each other? Why did the Catholic Church want to ignore pederasty?
He fried some spuds and then his slab of venison medium rare, still troubled that King David hadn’t committed a provable crime though he knew from cultural history that some of the grandest crimes aren’t technically against the law. They were simply the way people in power behaved.
The venison and fried potatoes with an amber glass of whiskey would have been even better if it weren’t for his errant thinking. The year before his computer crime colleague had told him that there were four million child porn sites. This was hard to believe but there was no reason for the man to lie. About a week later as a favor to Marion he had appeared at a middle school “career carnival” and talked to an assembly about jobs in law enforcement. He had been amazed at how widely varied the sixth, seventh, and eighth graders were. Some looked like mature high school students but many were just kids. In the question and answer period a diminutive girl with thick glasses and braces had squeaked, “I don’t think you guys should shoot people. It’s not Christian.”
“We don’t unless they’re trying to shoot us,” he had answered. “In forty years of law enforcement I’ve never shot anyone.” He did not mention a drunk man on his front porch aiming a shotgun at him. He was betting that the shotgun wasn’t loaded when the man’s very large wife jumped him from behind crushing him to the porch floor. Afterward Sunderson discovered the shotgun was loaded.
Now at the table forking in the last of the nearly bloody venison he recalled talking to the little girl after the assembly was over. She said she was twelve and read a lot of mysteries because she wanted to be a detective when she grew up. The obvious point was that a girl that age was King David’s favorite prey and an adult male who tampered with such a girl should be permanently imprisoned as hopeless scum. There was a fairly specific theory and practice of law enforcement that gave an appearance of sane equilibrium until you put a particular human face in place and then your stomach would begin churning.
He fell asleep a full two hours with his head on his arms on the table and then woke up and reheated some brackish coffee. He began reading D. H. Lawrence quoting Crevec?ur, “I must tell you that there is something in the proximity of the woods which is very singular.” And then hunters, “The chase renders them ferocious, gloomy, and unsociable; a hunter wants no neighbors, he rather hates them, because he dreads the competition… Eating of wild meat, whatever you may think, tends to alter their tempers…”
